Raja

we have 120 client computers. and it will just be used for curriculam network and printers for student and teachers. we have a separate server for admin stuff. let me know if there is any other information you may need to advice me.

Thanks for all your advice guys. rely appreciate it. Is there a good company anyone can recommend so I can speak with them and see whats what. Honestly I had enough of CC3 because of all the small but annoying problems. eg. any system changes made or install would make the Active Primary 3 come up with an error and to resolve it and Admin has to log in and run the program and log off. Then you have internet not working randomly when users log in. stuff like that.

Hi guys, We are currently running RM CC3 and wanted to move to eithe cc4 or vanilla, I am even considering out sourcing it to another company to manage our server. We had allot of issues with CC3 and I also heard CC4 has its share of problems. So any recommendation would greatly be appreciated. We are running around 130 clients including laptops.

Thanks for the advice so far guys. I am independent/contracted to the school, so no chance of them getting me trained. I'll have to do it myself. Which is what I did previously - got my Microsoft certification for NT and 98 and XP and paid for it myself. I'm sure I could grab a decent book and learn, if not, then find a decent course. Yes, we are a Primary school, and that's why I'm trying to keep it as simple and reliable as possible. My plan is to have 1 single login (used simultaneously) for each year group for when they are in the ICT room, so they all have their specific desktop icons and applications. Individual login for each staff member, so they could log on to whichever PC available, as and when needed. Since they will all log onto the Domain, pretty much everyone will be a member of Domain Users group, hence restricting their ability to install or uninstall applications and create problems. I've had 2-3 incidents of Spyware recently where some staff members 'think' they know better and have installed things they should not ! And preventing that is a priority I feel. After that comes the ability to have their own custom desktop/settings when they log onto whichever PC. Have a folder for each year group, and then one each for staff members, which has their documents, and if possible, their settings, etc. All running off the server, so the actual PC is not really messed around with. As mentioned, I've created a test account on the domain, logged into it from a test laptop and it works OK. Just a simple setup. Now, before I start to roll-out that concept across the board, starting with the new ICT room, I want to do my research and your guidance, and take the best possible to getting the PCs logging into the Domain, each getting their IP addresses from the DHCP server, and eventually, creating a decent Windows network, rather than the peer-to-peer setup I've inherited.

Hi everyone Firstly, thanks to everyone on this excellent forum for all their help and advice. I've been on & off for a couple of months now, learning as much as I can. I'm the only ICT person at a Primary School, and have slowly, painfully, built up the entire ICT and IT capabilities over the last year and a bit. I inherited a massive clutter of old PCs running Win98, and slowly replaced them with new(ish) PCs as we went along. When I started, I was handed 20 odd brand new Dell Optiplex PCs and a Dell PowerEdge 2800 server running Win 2003 Server - all in a box, to set up and get going in a week. It was really hard at times, what with NOBODY understanding anything about IT even remotely. I had no documentation of any sort, nobody knew who to contact at the Local authority, no network information, and so on. Anyway, we now have about 70 odd PCs spread around (including about 10-12 in Admin). We've just had a new ICT room built with 30 brand new PCs running Windows XP (included in the 70 mentioned above). Each PC took 3-4 hours installing everything, Updates, etc, etc. Very basic setup, XP SP2, Office 2003 SP3, all updated, and a simple B/W network printer for everyone to use. The entire network is a peer-to-peer, where I've had to set up a manual IP address for each PC (and each printer or network device) to get things up and running and get the staff back to normal after the last IT people left the mess, with hardly anything working properly. I have been fiddling with the server in the last couple of days and managed to set it up as a Domain Controller, as well as DHCP server. Connected a test laptop to it now, logging in as a User, with limited priviliges, as I've had staff installing random things and causing grief ! Now, what I want to do is create Profiles for everyone, at least the staff, not necessarily for each child (yet !). I'd like to then install software on the server, and then when users log in, they can run the relevant applications ? Am I being really daft in wanting that ? Otherwise I'll be going around installing about 25 different applications on each of the 30 PCs and then some more, as & when new software is bought and is required on the class PCs as well. Most of my time since I've been here has been taken away trying to get PCs to stay working, fire-fighting silly issues all day long, and it's delayed me so much from doing this whole thing. Login scripts ? Group policies ? I'm totally lost for ideas to start - any help or advice is appreciated. Thanks in advance....